Micro-Management

Hiring an Assistant, Ten Minutes at a Time

All these simple pleasures have two things in common: they should take about ten minutes. And someone else
should be doing them for you.

Which brings us to Microworkers, a new site devoted to finding you someone to handle your
ten-minute chores, online now.

Consider it your own personal jobs board for life's tiniest tasks. Here's what you do: the next time you
have a ten-minute job that needs handling—posting that picture of you and Bono to Flickr—you'll
log in and list the gig. You'll want to say how much you're willing to pay—most jobs will cost you the
princely sum of about one dollar—and wait for someone (dubbed a "Microworker") to bid. (Like a real
employer, you can choose whether you prefer American or foreign labor. Generally, foreign labor is cheaper,
but we think you can't put a price on adding "Made in the USA" to your Facebook page.)

Once the job is completed, you can grade the person's performance—if that lowball bidder removed the
green M&M's instead of the red ones, you can basically fire them, Up in the Air-style. Or you
can reward good workers by contracting them to do your next ten-minute job.